Historical materialism: is the economic base determinant of the superstructure?

Karl Marx, answered from the texts and cited to the page.

The position in brief

The materialist conception of history is the foundation of everything else. The mode of production of material life conditions the social, political, and intellectual life-process in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but their social being that determines their consciousness. The relations of production correspond to a definite stage of development of the material productive forces; the totality of these relations constitutes the economic structure of society — the real foundation, on which a legal and political superstructure rises and to which definite forms of social consciousness correspond.¹²³

At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces come into conflict with the existing relations of production; from forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an epoch of social revolution.⁴⁵

Sources

1. The totality of these relations of production forms the economic structure of society, the real basis 'Preface' to the Critique of Political Economy from which rises a legal and political superstructure, and to which correspond specific forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the social, political and intellectual life-process generally.

   Preface’ to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, p. 160

2. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life.

   4. The Accumulation of Capitals and the Competition among the Capitalists, pp. 425–427

3. From forms of development of the forces of production these relations turn into their fetters. Then comes the period of social revolution. With the change of the economic foundation the entire immense superstructure is more or less rapidly transformed.

   A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy

4. On the other hand, at that time when good intentions 'to push forward' often took the place of factual knowledge, an echo of French socialism and communism, slightly tinged by philosophy, was noticeable in the Rheinische Zeitung.

   4. The Accumulation of Capitals and the Competition among the Capitalists, p. 425

5. When, therefore, the publishers of the "Rheinische Zeitung" conceived the illusion that by a less aggressive policy the paper could be saved from the death sentence pronounced upon it, I was glad to grasp that opportunity to retire to my study room from public life.

   A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy

Where the argument is made

• The German Ideology (1845-46, the first formulation of the materialist conception of history)
• Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1859, the most famous statement: 'It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being that determines their consciousness')
• 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (the dialectic of agency and structure: 'men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please')
• Capital Vol I, Part VIII on primitive accumulation

How the argument was received

The most-attacked Marxian thesis and the central battleground for both vulgar economic-determinist readings (the textbook caricature) and Western-Marxist humanist softenings. G.A. Cohen (1978) provides the most rigorous analytical defense, reformulating the thesis as a functional explanation: relations of production are explained by their tendency to develop the productive forces. Althusser's "overdetermination" and "structural causality" attempt a non-economistic reading. Western-Marxist softenings (Lukács, Sartre, the Frankfurt School) emphasize consciousness and agency; Stedman Jones (2016) reads Marx as a 19th-century intervener whose later reception distorted the thesis.